Daniel Radcliffe talks HARRY POTTER 6 and 7

Just a few hours ago I attended the “December Boys” press day and got to participate in a roundtable interview with one of the biggest movie stars on the planet – Daniel Radcliffe, aka Harry Potter.

And while a full transcript is going to be posted soon, I wanted to get what he said about “Harry Potter” posted immediately, as I know the way Harry Potter fans are.

And for those who are curious, they start filming Half-Blood Prince in 10 days and I asked him if he’d be cool with Alfonso Cuaron coming back and directing the final film. I also asked him to talk about reading the final book and what that experience was like.

As always, you can either read the transcript or listen to the entire interview as an MP3 by clicking here. If you want to hear the Harry Potter stuff, it’s towards the end.

And if you’d like to watch some movie clips from Daniel’s new movie “December Boys” click here.

Q: Did you go straight to the epilogue when the new Harry Potter book came out?

Daniel: I did indeed. No, I didn’t go straight to the epilogue, that’s what my grandmother does.

Q: What did you think of the final Harry Potter book?

Daniel: In terms of the ending of the book, I was thrilled. Has anybody not read the seventh book – okay, cool, I was very, very pleased because I basically get the best of both worlds, because I get the scene of my demise and also I get to live on after that, which is any actors’ dream, you get to die and then you get more screen time, it’s fantastic.

Q: Are you filming now?

Daniel: I start ‘6’ in 10 days.

Q: Any special preparations, special iTunes list?

Daniel: Not yet, but I’m sure I will before we start filming.

Q: Can you talk about where you were reading the book and what you were experiencing as you were reading it?

Daniel: Totally. There’s a quote, I’m not going to take this interview down too pretentious a route though this next bit but there’s a quote from Chekhov when he wrote to the woman who was the final love of his life, who he later married and I think died with, not that she died but he was with her when he died, and he addresses a letter to her and he says, ‘Hello, the last page of my life.’ Which seemed very appropriate to me reading this book, because he has been such a part of my life now, I’ve been with him through all my teen years, and you were suddenly aware that – I started reading it, it was wow, this is the last time I will take a journey with this character, and it was quite a special moment, and actually while reading the final chapters I was listening to Sigur Ros which was very, very appropriate actually, it really, really was, God I’d love them to do a song for one of the films, they’d be absolutely fantastic.

Q: Were you thinking about it as you were reading it, oh my God this book is amazing, and it’s going to be such a good movie?

Daniel: I was thinking, how are we going to make it into a movie? It’s going to be tough, but that’s why someone cleverer than me adapts them. I think if we get it right, which I’m confident we will, it should be amazing.

Q: Have you read the script for Half-Blood Prince yet?

Daniel: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Q: Have they adapted that book well, they have to cut them down so much.

Daniel: They have to. Obviously things have taken out, but everything that drives the story forward is very much in place.

Q: And you’re doing a play right after you finish Half-Blood Prince?

Daniel: There’s a little gap and hopefully if I can find another film to make than that would be really cool, but if not, yeah I might actually rest.

Q: A lot of people read the book in one or two days, did you feel you needed to read it quickly so someone didn’t spoil it for you

Daniel: Weirdly I didn’t. I was at a cricket match when it came out, so I didn’t really start reading it properly. I read the first 30 pages one night, and then said, ‘Right, I’m not going to pick it up again until I’ve got proper time to really have a go at this book.’ And actually no one spoiled the ending for me, I thought they would. I thought someone was going to shout it out what happened. But the brilliant thing about it actually – she sort of made it spoiler proof, because even though if someone does say what state Harry ends up in, you don’t know the half of it which is pretty impressive. When I finally did get to read it I did read it in about a day and a half just because I didn’t put it down.

Q: A lot of people thought Alfonso Cuaron did such an amazing job of the third movie and he’s talked about he’d be willing to come back to the franchise, would you like to have him back for book seven.

Daniel: It’s a very interesting question. I loved working with Alfonso, so I don’t want this to be misinterpreted in the slightest, but I really love working with David Yates. Who knows if he’ll do book seven. But also I think to be honest it’s really nice to have new directors come on board. Who know, it’s a long way off, book seven, it depends if David is willing to do it, I don’t know if he will be, it’s a long way off so I don’t know at the moment. But I would love to work with him (Alfonso) again in the future, I don’t know if Potter will be the place where that happens.

Q: You’re okay with Yates coming back for book seven.

Daniel: If he wanted to, yeah totally.

Q: Did you have a good 18th birthday party?

Daniel: I had fabulous 18th birthday party, thank you very much.

Q: We didn’t hear anything about it.

Daniel: Good.

Q: Do you have any great summer memories?

Daniel: This summer was pretty good, because I got to go to Lords for my birthday.